The present invention relates to a device for storing and dispensing food products. More particularly, this invention relates to a kitchen implement that serves to store, dispense, and apply measured portions of foodspreads.
Foodspreads may include such spreadable substances as butter, cream cheese, jam, peanut butter, cake frosting, and any other spreadable or formable product. Although the term foodspread will be used throughout this disclosure to describe any spreadable substance, butter will be used as an exemplary foodspread.
Many people prefer the taste of butter to butter substitutes. However, butter is tedious and messy to use. For example, using butter traditionally involves retrieving a stick of butter in its dedicated butter dish from a refrigerator, retrieving a knife, slicing off a desired portion of the stick, placing the portion of butter on a food product, waiting for the butter to melt, attempting to spread the butter, returning the butter to the refrigerator, and finally disposing of the soiled knife.
Spreading cold butter is often difficult or impossible, particularly on soft breads, because cold butter is relatively solid. The alternative, and often required, step is to wait for the butter to melt on the desired surface before spreading is possible. Waiting is time-consuming and annoying. Slicing exactly the desired amount from a stick of cold butter can be difficult, as well. For the sake of convenience, many people slice off and use more than they actually desire. To overcome these problems, some people store butter at room temperature to soften it. This hastens spoilage and degrades the taste.
Many people use butter substitutes because they are more easily spreadable. A large number of those people would prefer to use butter were it more easy to use.
There is a long-felt need to improve the process of using butter. To address this need, numerous devices are described in the patent literature. Each of the devices has inadequacies that hinder its usefulness and acceptance in the marketplace. None has achieved widespread commercial usage. Some of the disadvantages of the prior art devices are outlined here.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,884,877 (1959) to Nalbone, describes a device for the purpose of spreading butter or the like. The Nalbone device includes a main body with a substantially perpendicularly attached combination stationary handle/lever. The Nalbone device has three disadvantages. First, a single discharge outlet is shaped such that it spreads butter in a single relatively thin layer of sufficient width to cover a slice of bread. This outlet profile severely restricts the manner and precision with which food or objects may be covered. For example, the described single outlet limits the user to apply accurately butter to bread or bread-shaped articles only. Second, a bottom surface of the Nalbone device's main body incorporates a shape that is designed to shear off and smooth the extruded butter. The shearing process of the Nalbone device does not cover odd-shaped surfaces accurately, and the smoothing function leaves the bottom of the device is a soiled state. Third, the stationary handle/lever are oriented largely perpendicular with the main body of the Nalbone device. The handle is used to hold and position the device, and the lever is used to actuate a piston within the main body. In this perpendicular orientation, the handle and the lever appear overly utilitarian for a kitchen aid or table utensil. Another disadvantage of the perpendicular orientation is that the device is needlessly complex and costly to manufacture. Still another disadvantage of the perpendicular handle/lever design is that the device is needlessly cumbersome and requires significant attentiveness and manual coordination to manipulate. Such diligence can make the Nalbone device hard to use for children and arthritic persons. Still another disadvantage of the perpendicular orientation is that this design makes the Nalbone device unable to fit in most refrigerators' butter storage compartments.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,955,114 (1999) to Llanos, discloses a device for extruding a stick of butter or the like. The Llanos device describes fundamentally the same handle and actuation member as the Nalbone device, with the same disadvantages. In addition, the Llanos device has a tip for extruding that is described as a rectangular nozzle. The shape of the Llanos tip generally distributes butter onto a surface in an unfinished manner. The butter must then be spread manually in a separate step. The additional spreading step is an inconvenience that makes the Llanos device time-consuming to use.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,920,156 (1975) to Hicks, describes a butter dispenser that has a different lever orientation then the Nalbone and Llanos dispensers. The Hicks lever is oriented parallel with the main body's longitudinal axis, but the lever is designed to be pulled away from the body. This lever design necessitates using both hands simultaneously. The need to use both hands on a device can be problematic for persons with one hand, or when a person needs to hold a receiving food or container. The Hicks device also has a non-extruding outlet that is intended to expose the unaltered stick of butter, that is then sliced and spread manually. The use of the Hicks device, with its outlet design, is as messy and time-consuming as the use of butter in a conventional manner.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,458,120 (1947) to Volpini, U.S. Pat. No. 4,981,041 (1991) to Merkle, and U.S. Pat. No. D217,007 (1970) to Smith each describe dispensers that have a plurality of outlets for the discharge of butter or food product. The dispensers described in these references rely on a manually-operated plunger to push out the butter. As cold butter is relatively hard and difficult to reshape, such manually-operated plungers would be almost impossible to operate easily. In addition, the two-dimensional, array-like, outlet configuration described in these references cause the discharged extrusions to overlap each other when applied in a typical manner. This overlapping tends to apply butter too densely and is wasteful and detrimental to diet control.